Maxime Bernier operates according to the principle there’s only one thing worse than being talked about — and that’s not being talked about.

Mr. Bernier, the de-frocked former Foreign Minister, is back in the news because he supports a New Democratic Party private members’ bill that would require officers of Parliament to be bilingual.

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In an interview Tuesday, he reiterated his belief that it’s a good bill and he will work towards its passage.

This has caused consternation in Conservative ranks because it is pushing the government towards a position it does not necessarily want to take – enacting a law that in future requires senior parliamentary officers such as the Auditor-General to be fluent in English and French.

“Bernier did himself no favours by talking about the bill before it had been debated in Cabinet,” said one senior Conservative.

The degree of confusion in Tory ranks can be judged by the response of James Moore, the Heritage Minister, who was initially opposed to the idea but later said officers of Parliament should be bilingual.

The government has been pressured by Mr. Bernier’s one man campaign, which apparently included him telling people he was prepared to resign his job as Minister of State for Small Business and Tourism over the issue.

With a Cabinet shuffle in the offing that may not have been the smartest move, but it appears to have been a calculated gamble by Mr. Bernier, who is aware that the Prime Minister only has five MPs from Quebec to choose from.

Christian Paradis is the subject of a number of investigations by the ethics watchdog and is generally viewed as having been uninspiring as Industry Minister and Quebec lieutenant. That leaves Veterans Affairs Minister Steven Blaney, Transport Minister Denis Lebel and Jacques Gourde, the parliamentary secretary for Public Works. Given the shallowness of this political gene pool, Mr. Bernier apparently figures all other indiscretions will be forgiven.

The Harper government may not want to support the NDP bill but it is clear that opposing it, or even remaining neutral, would send out the wrong message to a province ever-vigilant for real or perceived slights.

The Conservatives could bring forward their own version of the bill, or even legislate that institutions, rather than individuals, must be bilingual. The issue will go to Cabinet before the NDP bill is debated in the House of Commons this fall.

While they may be cursing Mr. Bernier for breaching Cabinet solidarity, the maverick MP from the Beauce has at least concentrated minds in the Prime Minister’s Office about the need to invigorate the party’s efforts in Quebec.

There is recognition at the highest levels of government that there has to be more visibility in Quebec. “Step one is to be there,” said the senior Conservative, who confirmed that there will be a renewed push by the party over the summer, including a high turnout of Cabinet ministers at the St. Jean Baptiste celebrations in Quebec City on June 24.

This will be music to the ears of many Conservatives, including former prime minister Brian Mulroney, who privately expressed his frustration with the Harper government’s efforts in his home province when he was in Ottawa last week.

Having no credibility in Quebec is not an option for the Conservative Party

Senator Hugh Segal, Mr. Mulroney’s former chief of staff, said the Conservative majority may have been won without Quebec, but the province remains key. He said success in Ontario is tied to the party being “viable and engaged” in Quebec. “Having no credibility in Quebec is not an option for the Conservative Party. That includes being mindful of language rights in the parliamentary precinct.”

Mr. Segal believes that the Liberals will be stronger at the next election – a development he welcomes, since three-way fights should make Conservative gains easier. But success will require more policies that resonate at the local level and a strategy built from the ground up.

His hopes of a Conservative revival in Quebec may be forlorn.

Most polls put the party in the mid-teens, exactly where they were a year ago. “People have discarded them. They used to have the embryo of a machine using people from the ADQ. And they used to have a reputation as good fiscal managers. But the ADQ is gone and the F35 story is not helping them,” said one former Quebec MP.

“They’re missing what Mulroney had – strong Quebec lieutenants. The best spokespeople for the party in French are from Calgary — Jason Kenney and Harper himself.”

If he wants to spark a revival the Prime Minister may have to go maverick himself, by making the charismatic fiscal conservative from the Beauce the face of the Conservative government in Quebec.

On his website, the man they call Mad Max boasts that if the party wants Conservative principles to win the battle, “we have to defend them openly, with passion and with conviction.” He has done his part to live up to the rhetoric, saying last year that Quebec doesn’t need Bill 101 to protect the French language or to foster national identity – a statement denounced by both the governing Liberals and the Parti Québécois.

Despite the orange wave that eroded his support by 12% in the May election, Mr. Bernier still triumphed by more than 11,000 votes.

He may be a non-conformist, but he’s a winner. And as King George the Second said of General James Wolfe, another man who knew something about winning in Quebec: “If he’s mad, I hope he’ll bite some of my other generals.”

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